William Engdahl on the Ukraine Operation
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Category Archives: Economics
Snowden’s Written Testimony to EU Parliament
… The first principle any inquiry must take into account is that despite extraordinary political pressure to do so, no western government has been able to present evidence showing that such [mass surveillance] programs are necessary. In the United States, the heads of our spying services once claimed that 54 terrorist attacks had been stopped by mass surveillance, but two independent White House reviews with access to the classified evidence on which this claim was founded concluded it was untrue, as did a Federal Court.
Looking at the US government’s reports here is valuable. The most recent of these investigations, performed by the White House’s Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board, determined that the mass surveillance program investigated was not only ineffective — they found it had never stopped even a single imminent terrorist attack — but that it had no basis in law. In less diplomatic language, they discovered the United States was operating an unlawful mass surveillance program, and the greatest success the program had ever produced was discovering a taxi driver in the United States transferring $8,500 dollars to Somalia in 2007….
Despite the extraordinary intrusions of the NSA and EU national governments into private communications world-wide, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the “Underwear Bomber,” was allowed to board an airplane traveling from Europe to the United States in 2009. The 290 persons on board were not saved by mass surveillance, but by his own incompetence, when he failed to detonate the device. While even Mutallab’s own father warned the US government he was dangerous in November 2009, our resources were tied up monitoring online games and tapping German ministers. That extraordinary tip-off didn’t get Mutallab a dedicated US investigator. All we gave him was a US visa.
Nor did the US government’s comprehensive monitoring of Americans at home stop the Boston Bombers. Despite the Russians specifically warning us about Tamerlan Tsarnaev, the FBI couldn’t do more than a cursory investigation — although they did plenty of worthless computer-based searching – and failed to discover the plot. 264 people were injured, and 3 died. The resources that could have paid for a real investigation had been spent on monitoring the call records of everyone in America….
The NSA granted me the authority to monitor communications world-wide using its mass surveillance systems, including within the United States. I have personally targeted individuals using these systems under both the President of the United States’ Executive Order 12333 and the US Congress’ FAA 702. I know the good and the bad of these systems, and what they can and cannot do, and I am telling you that without getting out of my chair, I could have read the private communications of any member of this committee, as well as any ordinary citizen. I swear under penalty of perjury that this is true.
These are not the capabilities in which free societies invest. Mass surveillance violates our rights, risks our safety, and threatens our way of life.
If even the US government, after determining mass surveillance is unlawful and unnecessary, continues to operate to engage in mass surveillance, we have a problem. I consider the United States Government to be generally responsible, and I hope you will agree with me. Accordingly, this begs the question many legislative bodies implicated in mass surveillance have sought to avoid: if even the US is willing to knowingly violate the rights of billions of innocents — and I say billions without exaggeration — for nothing more substantial than a “potential” intelligence advantage that has never materialized, what are other governments going to do?
Whether we like it or not, the international norms of tomorrow are being constructed today, right now, by the work of bodies like this committee. If liberal states decide that the convenience of spies is more valuable than the rights of their citizens, the inevitable result will be states that are both less liberal and less safe. Thank you.
I will now respond to the submitted questions. Please bear in mind that I will not be disclosing new information about surveillance programs: I will be limiting my testimony to information regarding what responsible media organizations have entered into the public domain. For the record, I also repeat my willingness to provide testimony to the United States Congress, should they decide to consider the issue of unconstitutional mass surveillance. …
https://www.commondreams.org/view/2014/03/07-4
It’s curious that Snowden is willing to give so much gatekeeping leeway to Greenwald. The details of this relationship certainly bear further scrutiny. In any case, given his cluelessness regarding both the underwear bomber and the boston bombing, as well as his silence on 9/11, it’s clear snowden is either a limited hangout or didn’t have the highest levels of access that would reveal the machinations behind those false flag events. But his statement does beg the question of what the real intent of all this mass surveillance is, if not even to protect us from the chosen boogie man of the day. Is it just the institutional impulse to expand without limit? Or are millions of law-abiding citizens to be targetted for nefarious purposes? Your guess is as good as mine, but I’ll just point out some of the history of how such computerized research and catalogs of names were used in the past, in iran (~1980), indonesia (~1965) and nazi germany. In the first two cases the US embassy provided lists of people to be killed by the new regime (yes the US supported Khomeini’s rise to power, part of its islamic fundamentalist approach to foreign subterfuge which gave rise to AQ). In the latter case of course IBM helped catalog the lists of people to be deported to concentration camps.
Obviously I could be wrong, but given the overall context of the export of US jobs and the increasing impoverishment and oppression of the american people, not to mention the impunity of the american financiers who gave rise to hitler, it would fit like a glove. The powers that be are malthusian eugenicists and don’t deserve trust by any stretch of the imagination. At best they are scam artist parasites, and at worst they are wanna-be mass murderers.
The Last Chance for Human Civilization
It’s a bit late in the game but it can’t be stressed enough that as america goes, so will the rest of the world. The USA had the key to world peace after the collapse of the USSR, but it was squandered on empire games. As the US becomes a police state under the fraudulent pretext of the self-inflicted “war on terror”, other countries will do the same in response to its external manifestations. It’s still not too late to reverse course, but time is growing short. Of course the achilles heel of the traitors has always been the obviously staged attack of 9/11 and its precursors in oklahoma city and elsewhere, but if you’re still not there yet after the looking at the reference section here then there’s nothing I can say that will open your eyes. May your chains rest lightly on you.
A review of US trade, education and drug policies over the past 20 years leads me to conclude that this country is worth more to finance capital as a resource extraction “sacrificial zone” and military enforcer than as an industrial power, mainly because american culture and what remains of constitutional law will not easily accomodate outright slavery such as exists in china. The implication is that most of us will be targetted for extermination under one pretext or another. A staged domestic terror attack blamed on dissidents, a gmo pandemic (http://www.legitgov.org/baxter_flu_vaccine_260409.html) with real and fake vaccines, even war with russia would suit their depopulation agenda. Not at all far fetched given the real history of nazi germany, whose intellectual and financial underwriters in new york and london spawned the current crop of aristocrats leading the way to national ruin.
In any case, the financial casino is looking pretty toppy and they’re going to need someone to frame for the economic collapse that they caused when it happens. With the ukraine operation looking increasingly ugly, and the empire’s unsated thirst for global domination, war with russia would serve them well both domestically and abroad. But who knows, maybe they’ll kick the can down the road some more. I’ve always underestimated their patience. But their options are steadily narrowing with increasing public awareness and diminishing support for the US dollar.
Anyway, not to be too sentimental or white-washy about american history, but the constitution was a damn good idea. Here’s a ballad in remembrance of dreams gone by.
Infiltrated NGOs Act as Adjunct to US State Dept
The U.S. and NATO Encirclement of Russia
The Big Picture: The U.S. and NATO Have Been Trying to Encircle Russia Militarily Since 1991
The American press portrays Putin as being the bad guy and the aggressor in the Ukraine crisis.
Putin is certainly no saint. A former KGB agent, Putin’s net worth is estimated at some $40 billion dollars … as he has squeezed money out of the Russian economy by treating the country as his own personal fiefdom. And all sides appear to have dirt on their hands in the Russia-Ukraine crisis.
But we can only see the bigger picture if we take a step back and gain a little understanding of the history underlying the current tensions.
Indeed, the fact that the U.S. has allegedly paid billions of dollars to anti-Russian forces in Ukraine – and even purportedly picked the Ukrainian president – has to be seen in context.
Veteran New York Times reporter Steven Kinzer notes at the Boston Globe:
From the moment the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, the United States has relentlessly pursued a strategy of encircling Russia, just as it has with other perceived enemies like China and Iran. [Background here, here and here.] It has brought 12 countries in central Europe, all of them formerly allied with Moscow, into the NATO alliance. US military power is now directly on Russia’s borders.
“I think it is the beginning of a new cold war,” warned George Kennan, the renowned diplomat and Russia-watcher, as NATO began expanding eastward. “I think the Russians will gradually react quite adversely, and it will affect their policies.”
Stephen Cohen – professor emeritus at New York University and Princeton University who has long focused on Russia – explained this weekend on CNN:
We are witnessing as we talk the making possibly of the worst history of our lifetime. We are watching the descending of a new cold war divide between west and east, only this time, it is not in far away Berlin, it’s right on Russia’s borders through the historical civilization in Ukraine. It’s a crisis of historic magnitude. If you ask how we got in it, how we got into the crisis, and how therefore do we get out, it is time to stop asking why Putin – why Putin is doing this or that, but ask about the American policy, and the European Union policy that led to this moment….
Paranoia > control
paranoia |ˌparəˈnoiə| noun
a mental condition characterized by delusions of persecution, unwarranted jealousy, or exaggerated self-importance, typically elaborated into an organized system. It may be an aspect of chronic personality disorder, of drug abuse, or of a serious condition such as schizophrenia in which the person loses touch with reality.
• suspicion and mistrust of people or their actions without evidence or justification : the global paranoia about hackers and viruses.
ORIGIN early 19th cent.: modern Latin, from Greek, from paranoos ‘distracted,’ from para ‘irregular’ + noos ‘mind.’
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Question: Is it paranoia if it is happening? See How Covert Agents Infiltrate the Internet to Manipulate, Deceive, and Destroy Reputations By Glenn Greenwald https://firstlook.org/theintercept/2014/02/24/jtrig-manipulation/
Answer: It depends on who you are. The good people of America and the world are being spied on by the NSA – National Security Agency. The good people of the world are sane. They are not paranoid; they are being spied on. And it’s not really the U.S. government.
There’s a government inside the government and I don’t control it.
~ President Bill ClintonGovernments are only there for Us to Rob, Loot and Pillage.
~President George H. W. Bush
And then there are those who have good reason to fear your awakening. They are the truly guilty and therefore the truly paranoid. They feel a need to spy on everyone and everything. They are looking always for the slightest reason to pounce on you and your family and friends.
Question: What’s that all about?
Answer: Rogue elements ruling an otherwise good country will naturally have an irrational desire to control everything, for they have committed numerous grievous crimes and they fear that you will find out! They know that when the public learns of their illegal and immoral activities, all the good people will be shaking their heads, pursing their lips and shaking their fingers: “Naughty, naughty, Illuminati!” Therefore, they want to know everything about you and what you know, and they want you to know nothing about them and what they have done and .are doing. Their disrespect is overflowing.
Sarah, If the people were to ever find out what we have done, we would be chased down the streets and lynched.
~ Said President George H W Bush in 1992 in an interview with Sarah McClendon of the Washington White House Press CorpsThe American People, The BUD People, The Broke Useless and Depressed. We are the MPBs, Money, Power and Brains. As long as we keep food on the BUDSTERS tables, a roof over their heads, a car in their driveway and gas in their gas tanks to go to and from work. We can keep the BUDSTERS at bay.
~ President George H.W. Bush
Problem: Those who act out of fear are doomed to relive fear – until and unless they heal (release) it.
Solution: May all who feel a need to control all people and all nations, allow total and complete healing of all the fear they are carrying so that they can relax at last and enjoy the beautiful planet and its beautiful people. Feeling a need to conquer, change and control nature and humanity is such a heavy burden to carry… for those who are very naughty and it places unnecessary challenges on those who are not naughty.
May Peace Reign!
Video: I am an American
Can Non-Violence Defeat the Illuminati?
CAN NON-VIOLENCE DEFEAT THE ILLUMINATI?
READ THIS ARTICLE, THE LINK TO WHICH IS BELOW.
Can Non-violent Action Deconstruct the Illuminati
Rule from the shadows – The psychology of power
The Localization Movement. Creating a Viable Local Economy
… The appropriate framework for a viable sub-economy is a democratically governed cooperative. Not just a consumer co-op, nor just a single-product worker’s co-op, but a cooperative entity that includes a variety of enterprises and shared resources, so that there are significant internal transactions. In this way we get the benefits promised by a local currency, as the internal transactions can simply be recorded on our books as co-op credits and debits.
Such a cooperative can be seen from two different perspectives. Viewed from the inside, the co-op is modeling the kind of society we want to create. Viewed from the outside, the co-op is a viable start-up business. By being a model of what we want, it is ‘building the new’; by being a viable start-up business, it is thriving ‘in the shadow of the old’. In order to serve as a model of the new, our co-op needs to operate in the way we want our new society to operate. In order to be a viable start-up business, our co-op needs to be launched with a sound business plan.
If we can ‘build it’ – a co-op that offers people real economic benefits – then ‘they will come’. If the co-op grows and prospers, more people will join. Ultimately, the community itself could be operating as a cooperative, participatory, entity. We would be building the new society in the shadow of the collapsing old society. A society in which people control their own destinies, working together. A society with a transformed culture, a culture based on participation, collaboration, empowerment, and inclusiveness….
Look at it this way, if your local grocer purchases food from thousands of miles away with paper dollars that just happen to be accepted as valuable currency in both places, you ability to survive depends on the perpetuation of that universal acceptance. The fed is printing almost a trillion dollars a year while the underlying economy which is denominated in that currency produces a small fraction of what it did 20 years ago. This isn’t rocket science. The time to grease the gears of localized economic activity is now.